A law team at Pinsent Masons has set out what they consider
are the 11 key challenges for the new information commissioner
Christopher Graham, who took over from Richard Thomas in
June.
1. Clear complaints backlog
His office should be reducing the
backlog
of complaints under both freedom of information and data
protection legislation. He should increase the range of
information, advice and guidance available to the public. The more
information the public has, the more individuals can hold public
sector organisations to account. The focus should be on individual
rights, rather than organisational responsibility.
2. Get up to speed quickly
Graham should be talking directly to the public and
organisations; he needs quickly to understand people's views and
perceptions of what the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO)
does well and badly.
3. Enforcement
He should use his new powers to issue civil penalty notices
which will provide an excellent opportunity to refresh the approach
to enforcement, which has been criticised in the past as
ineffective. The new commissioner has to show that failure to
respect fundamental principles will simply not be accepted by him
or his office.
Public expectations of organisations have increased and
organisations have responded. But some have failed to put privacy
at the core of what they do and how they operate. The new
commissioner has to send a powerful message that such an approach
will not be tolerated by him.
4. Financial services and the public sector
For the public sector the biggest issues are the
Freedom of Information (FOI)
Act and the need to get the number of complaints down. The
drive towards data sharing, shared services and joined up working
will continue to present challenges from a data sharing and
governance perspective. The ICO needs to offer clear and
authoritative guidance and work with the public sector to ensure it
is workable. It needs to be followed by clear guidance for the
public on what they should expect from the public sector.
For the financial services sector, extreme budgetary pressures
mean a focus on the bottom line. The ICO will have to show that
innovations from his office translate into meaningful protection
for individuals and do not damage the bottom line. He needs to show
that new initiatives will help organisations rather than simply
increase the administrative burden.
5. Personal data concerns
The personal data concerns of the average British resident will
increase over the next five years. This will become apparent as the
public becomes more aware of the importance of data held about
them, in line with the growth in social networking sites.
6. Changing technologies
The ICO must keep up with changing technologies and
international influences. One way to do this is to make connections
in academia and with cutting-edge technology developers. This can
be achieved through his ongoing work on the Article 29 Working
Party and through a developing partnership with business.
7. Communicating FOI to citizens
People need to understand not just that the right to freedom of
information exists, but the scope of it. Individuals know they can
ask for information but have not been provided with the right tools
and resources to assess the answers.
8. Data security
Personal data is not secure. It is nonsense to try to reassure
people that it is. It is ultimately the job of the organisations
holding data to keep it secure, not the ICO's.
9. Build on Richard Thomas's successes and failures
Richard Thomas' success was the way he worked with the press and
his ability to popularise the debate. Some may argue that this was
his failing too, along with his failure to connect with the public
in quite the same way he did with the media.
He was also successful in stepping up enforcement action and
increasing the level of public debate. However in our view he
tended to focus on the politics, rather than holding organisations
to account on the detail.
10. After five years of the new information commissioner,
what achievements would determine his success?
Building a commitment to privacy rights into the fabric of
decision-making, and more public engagement. Recent events have
shown the public can be effective at moving Government.
11. Some more key challenges for Graham over the next five
years?
He needs to make the data debate sensible, tone down the
hysteria, and get rid of emotive terms like "surveillance society"
and "Big Brother." The issues are too important to be trivialised
by journalistic twitter. Only once this happens will the real
dialogue be able to begin - the dialogue with government to address
the issues raised by the expanding database culture.
He also needs to keep focused on the big picture rather than
getting drawn in to fringe debates. He should drive the debate
rather than be driven by it.
About the new information commissioner >>